What facts do you.have your kids memorize?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Memorization is not the same as education. They can google any of that. I would rather have them remember from working with the concepts and relationships of each topic as opposed to rote memorization.

Memory is a part of a functioning brain. It is essential, and you have to develop it to learn optimally. It's not an either/or. You don't build your memory at the expense of critical thinking and cross-curricular learning; you do it in tandem and the two functions help each other. That's like saying you will only work out your leg muscles and not the res of the body because you value running -- you are a better runner if your whole body is strong. Also, without the basic information kids normally memorize, you don't even know what to Google -- there are facts you need to know in order to be able to exercise your problem solving skills.

Kids with low working memory are diagnosed with learning disabilities. Adults with poor memory are diagnosed with dementia. The part of the brain that functions for memory is vital -- exercise it and grow it. Ignore it at your own peril.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Memorization is not the same as education. They can google any of that. I would rather have them remember from working with the concepts and relationships of each topic as opposed to rote memorization.

The dumbing down of the populace curtesy of google.

Lol

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bible verses

Hallelujah

[Anonymous]

Kids should practice using their memory every day on anything they are interested in (interest helps focus the brain): math facts, poems, names of Thomas the Tank Engine trains, songs, period table, taxonomy of animals or plants, grocery lists, phone numbers, stats of baseball players.

A mix of poetic (poems, songs, bible verses, Shakespearean soliloquies), visual (country flags, state license plates, nautical flags, code symbols, puzzles, pattern games, quilting, matching and blind memory games), and linear lists (numbers, items, geographic names, list of presidents, football team rosters) is best, as they are different types of memory. The lists help the brain learn to organize less logical data into logical chunks -- for that having kids figure out their own best way to memorize the digits of Pi is a great exercise, not because anyone needs to know the digits of Pi, but because of the neurons that are built when the kid figures out a system for memorizing a long string of seemingly random digits. There are a log of great games that help kids build memory skills, some of which you probably play without realizing that you are training your kid's brain.

[Anonymous]

Full names and phone numbers of parents
911 for emergency
Grandma's phone number
Home address
Alphabet
Days of the week
Months of the year
Skip counting
Counting backwards from 100
Doubles, e,g. 2+2, 3=3, 4=4
Multiplication facts
Identifying the 50 states and DC on a map

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, do multiplication and division facts!!

+1 This is the only one we really drill.

First time hearing of division facts. I thought if you know multiplication facts, you know division facts, no?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, do multiplication and division facts!!

+1 This is the only one we really drill.

First time hearing of division facts. I thought if you know multiplication facts, you know division facts, no?

DP, but I've heard it depends on the kids. Some kids easily do the inversion and some don't. For those who don't, push the memorization. It may be that part way through memorizing, the concept clicks. If not at least they can quickly access the information while attempting long division.

I didn't have to do division facts with my oldest or youngest but got part way through with my middle until she suddenly just figured out how to quickly turn the multiplication fact into the division fact.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Certain states have formally brought back recitation so can look up Georgia, Arkansas dept of education as examples for what they have kids do at each grade level in ES (different poems/speeches at different ages, etc). Also lots of articles about benefit of recitation and how it maps the brains.

Neither Georgia or Arkansas has a strong public education system. I wouldn’t model anything on them.

DP. Sure they didn't have a strong education system. But it turns out a lot of these places cheerfully jumped on things like the science of reading bandwagon long before the blue states and their test scores are going up. Obviously education can only do so much to compensate for things like SES, though.

Something is working for Georgia. From Sept 2024 report, National Merit Semifinalists for GA= 624 from 126 schools, for VA = 394 for 110 schools (so not all from 1 school for either state- not all TJ or all prep school). Qualifying index 222 of VA, 218 for GA so if want to argue it’s only bc index lower can, but my I do buy into brain mapping and firing those neurons to exercise the brain when little being good- whether by learning instrument, physical exercise, memory games, recitation or all of the above. End of day for me though is making sure is fun and spending time with DS/DD. That’s really what they will remember. So not just shoving them in front of a screen to robot learn and parrot list of facts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Memorization is not the same as education. They can google any of that. I would rather have them remember from working with the concepts and relationships of each topic as opposed to rote memorization.

It’s not either/or. I came name all the states in alphabetical order from rote memorization. I would never need Google for that. Their little brains can soak up a lot of information not just the concepts of each topic.

Yeah I learned that song too but that never helped me with understanding a single thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Memorization is not the same as education. They can google any of that. I would rather have them remember from working with the concepts and relationships of each topic as opposed to rote memorization.

Turns out that knowing facts (memorization) is the basis of being able to comprehend something.

https://greatminds.org/english/blog/witwisdom/the-science-of-reading-what-is-prior-knowledge-and-why-is-it-important

Knowing facts is definitely NOT the same as memorization. Don’t you find it illuminating that the word “memorization” does not appear even once in that very long article that you used as a citation? Shouldn’t that tell you something?

[Anonymous]

There/their/they’re
Your/you’re
To/too/two
Then/than
Its/it’s
Fewer than/less than
The Smiths/The Smiths’

[Anonymous]

Multiplication

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Memorization is not the same as education. They can google any of that. I would rather have them remember from working with the concepts and relationships of each topic as opposed to rote memorization.

Turns out that knowing facts (memorization) is the basis of being able to comprehend something.

https://greatminds.org/english/blog/witwisdom/the-science-of-reading-what-is-prior-knowledge-and-why-is-it-important

Knowing facts is definitely NOT the same as memorization. Don’t you find it illuminating that the word “memorization” does not appear even once in that very long article that you used as a citation? Shouldn’t that tell you something?

"Memorization is the process of committing something to memory"

Memorizing it is included in the process of knowing it. If you don't want to memorize it by reciting it or whatever fine, but I think the rest of us are defining memorization to include any way of committing things to memory.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Memorization is not the same as education. They can google any of that. I would rather have them remember from working with the concepts and relationships of each topic as opposed to rote memorization.

Turns out that knowing facts (memorization) is the basis of being able to comprehend something.

https://greatminds.org/english/blog/witwisdom/the-science-of-reading-what-is-prior-knowledge-and-why-is-it-important

Knowing facts is definitely NOT the same as memorization. Don’t you find it illuminating that the word “memorization” does not appear even once in that very long article that you used as a citation? Shouldn’t that tell you something?

"Memorization is the process of committing something to memory"

Memorizing it is included in the process of knowing it. If you don't want to memorize it by reciting it or whatever fine, but I think the rest of us are defining memorization to include any way of committing things to memory.

Memorizing the names of the 50 states doesn’t mean you know anything at all about them. They are just words without meaning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Memorization is not the same as education. They can google any of that. I would rather have them remember from working with the concepts and relationships of each topic as opposed to rote memorization.

Turns out that knowing facts (memorization) is the basis of being able to comprehend something.

https://greatminds.org/english/blog/witwisdom/the-science-of-reading-what-is-prior-knowledge-and-why-is-it-important

Knowing facts is definitely NOT the same as memorization. Don’t you find it illuminating that the word “memorization” does not appear even once in that very long article that you used as a citation? Shouldn’t that tell you something?

"Memorization is the process of committing something to memory"

Memorizing it is included in the process of knowing it. If you don't want to memorize it by reciting it or whatever fine, but I think the rest of us are defining memorization to include any way of committing things to memory.

Memorizing the names of the 50 states doesn’t mean you know anything at all about them. They are just words without meaning.

And as people knew in the past (and many know today), learning the words is the first step to being able to add in meaning. I can't point to Kansas on a map if I don't know the word Kansas. I can learn "Kansas" and it's location on a map at the same time, or I can learn Kansas first. Is one better than the other? I don't know. Is knowing the location of Kansas better than not knowing it? I think so.